Does this qualify as a conspiracy? Via Capitoilette, collusion between 18 city leaders regarding their efforts to break up the Occupy movement:

Embattled Oakland Mayor Jean Quan, speaking in an interview with the BBC, casually mentioned that she was on a conference call with leaders of 18 US cities shortly before a wave of raids broke up Occupy Wall Street encampments across the country. “I was recently on a conference call with 18 cities across the country who had the same situation. . . .”

Many witnesses to the wave of government crackdowns on numerous #occupy encampments have been wondering aloud if the rapid succession was more than a coincidence; Jean Quan’s casual remark seems to clearly imply that it was.

As a former activist, Quan is a disgrace and should resign and apologize and go on a 15 month tour of all the Occupy Encampments and personally apologize and then retire to a cottage in the Andes.

PTxS

Anarchy Pony

Retiring to a cottage in the andes actually sounds kinda nice.

Jin The Ninja

the only thing about that i’d take issue with is eating guinea pigs….although i’m sure they are nice tasting in their own way….

http://www.facebook.com/people/Tex-Shelters/1179576752 Tex Shelters

As a former activist, Quan is a disgrace and should resign and apologize and go on a 15 month tour of all the Occupy Encampments and personally apologize and then retire to a cottage in the Andes.

PTxS

quartz99

You know, at first I was thinking that there might be some internal politicking going on. The police and Quan are often at loggerheads and they think she has too much control of them — whereas given the federal investigations they’ve been under and everything else, I think a lot of us in Oakland think the police need greater oversight exercised over them. Being a former activist I guess I was willing to grant her the rope to hang herself with rather than assuming she was automatically at fault. But then things started happening that showed just how on-board with this behavior she is, like her statement that the brutal behavior by the police was a “peaceful and cooperative removal.” Besides this admission about collusion to deprive citizens on their constitutional rights, she’s also started losing staff members who are publicly proclaiming that they refuse to be associated with her administration and her handling of Occupy Oakland, two in the last two days. I expect more defections soon.

Anonymous

You know, at first I was thinking that there might be some internal politicking going on. The police and Quan are often at loggerheads and they think she has too much control of them — whereas given the federal investigations they’ve been under and everything else, I think a lot of us in Oakland think the police need greater oversight exercised over them. Being a former activist I guess I was willing to grant her the rope to hang herself with rather than assuming she was automatically at fault. But then things started happening that showed just how on-board with this behavior she is, like her statement that the brutal behavior by the police was a “peaceful and cooperative removal.” Besides this admission about collusion to deprive citizens on their constitutional rights, she’s also started losing staff members who are publicly proclaiming that they refuse to be associated with her administration and her handling of Occupy Oakland, two in the last two days. I expect more defections soon.

Wanooski

Retiring to a cottage in the andes actually sounds kinda nice.

RoboBagons

Of course they did, makes sense right? I’m sure the government saw this all coming anyways, and have a lot more planned out then we know…

RoboBagons

Of course they did, makes sense right? I’m sure the government saw this all coming anyways, and have a lot more planned out then we know…

Abrunop

ohhh they’ll be back. we’ll be back.

Abrunop

ohhh they’ll be back. we’ll be back.

Monkey See Monkey Do

What’s all this talk in the comments section about ‘being a former activist’. What are you now then? Have you given up? too busy? (I hear that one alot). Or do you just have a very narrow view on what an activist is?

quartz99

Quan ran on a platform of being a former activist. I wasn’t saying _I_ was a former activist. I was saying that since _she_ is, I was willing to give her the benefit of the doubt at first.

Monkey See Monkey Do

sorry i mis-read your comment. Peace.

quartz99

I agree with you though. I want to know what she calls herself now then. Did she give up? Is someone blackmailing her? Or was her “activism” just a shallow attempt at getting into some kind of power position all along?

Monkey See Monkey Do

I mis-read peoples comments. So i take back what i just said. But there are many people out there who feel that way.

Gooncentral

It wasn’t city leaders that organized the crackdowns. It was someone with vested interests in the corporate empire and most likely used some serious pull ala CIA or some retarded government agency. City leaders do what their told otherwise they wind up being the victims of some ‘ unfortunate mishap’. And of course handing all those leaders a little stack of cash never hurts either. Play the game and crush all enemies

quartz99

It’s the DHS. They’ve been increasingly involved with the raids. My guess is that’s it’s a prelude to labeling all Occupiers as terrorist enemy combatants so they can be disappeared and tortured until they agree that 2+2=5 instead of just arrested and let go as they’re doing now. There will be no dissent when all dissenters are immediately silenced.

Harrisjohnson

I concur with quartz. It is probably the DHS This one may turn ugly. I recently heard that someone in the Oakland mayors office resigned over it. The cops are eventually going to use deadly force. In a place like Oakland it is inevitable. Quartz is right all occupiers and the movement will eventually be considered a threat to national security. Then we have got a real revolution on our hands. No country has ever permanently changed without a violent revolution of some kind. First Curfews, martial law, then everyone goes to guns and weapons.

Monkey See Monkey Do

“No country has ever permanently changed without a violent revolution of some kind”
There are Many Movements based on Non-Violent resistance and overall they were successful in not becoming a stage for mass violence. Ghandi and the independence movement. Martin Luther King and the Civil rights movement. The Anti-apartheid movement. There are many others.
Violent revolution changes society into a different expression of the exact same thing they were fighting against. Violence just breeds more violence and nothing will really change for the better.

Anon

You are conveniently failing to mention the violent counterparts that existed in each of those examples you have listed, which is the only reason that Ghandi and MLK’s respective positions were granted any legitimacy.

Monkey See Monkey Do

What’s all this talk in the comments section about ‘being a former activist’. What are you now then? Have you given up? too busy? (I hear that one alot). Or do you just have a very narrow view on what an activist is?

Gooncentral

It wasn’t city leaders that organized the crackdowns. It was someone with vested interests in the corporate empire and most likely used some serious pull ala CIA or some retarded government agency. City leaders do what their told otherwise they wind up being the victims of some ‘ unfortunate mishap’. And of course handing all those leaders a little stack of cash never hurts either. Play the game and crush all enemies

Anonymous

It’s the DHS. They’ve been increasingly involved with the raids. My guess is that’s it’s a prelude to labeling all Occupiers as terrorist enemy combatants so they can be disappeared and tortured until they agree that 2+2=5 instead of just arrested and let go as they’re doing now. There will be no dissent when all dissenters are immediately silenced.

Anonymous

Quan ran on a platform of being a former activist. I wasn’t saying _I_ was a former activist. I was saying that since _she_ is, I was willing to give her the benefit of the doubt at first.

Harrisjohnson

I concur with quartz. It is probably the DHS This one may turn ugly. I recently heard that someone in the Oakland mayors office resigned over it. The cops are eventually going to use deadly force. In a place like Oakland it is inevitable. Quartz is right all occupiers and the movement will eventually be considered a threat to national security. Then we have got a real revolution on our hands. No country has ever permanently changed without a violent revolution of some kind. First Curfews, martial law, then everyone goes to guns and weapons.

Harrisjohnson

I concur with quartz. It is probably the DHS This one may turn ugly. I recently heard that someone in the Oakland mayors office resigned over it. The cops are eventually going to use deadly force. In a place like Oakland it is inevitable. Quartz is right all occupiers and the movement will eventually be considered a threat to national security. Then we have got a real revolution on our hands. No country has ever permanently changed without a violent revolution of some kind. First Curfews, martial law, then everyone goes to guns and weapons.

Monkey See Monkey Do

“No country has ever permanently changed without a violent revolution of some kind”
There are Many Movements based on Non-Violent resistance and overall they were successful in not becoming a stage for mass violence. Ghandi and the independence movement. Martin Luther King and the Civil rights movement. The Anti-apartheid movement. There are many others.
Violent revolution changes society into a different expression of the exact same thing they were fighting against. Violence just breeds more violence and nothing will really change for the better.

Monkey See Monkey Do

sorry i mis-read your comment. Peace.

Monkey See Monkey Do

I mis-read peoples comments. So i take back what i just said. But there are many people out there who feel that way.

Simiantongue

“Does this qualify as a conspiracy?”

Absolutely. It’s one thing, city planners concern in dealing with the administrative difficulties of protests. Traffic, the use of more money for police and it’s effect on city budgets, maintaining public health etc. They claim with plausible deniability that these are the reasons for their actions.

A concerted effort such as coordinated effort to “crack down” on occupy movements goes far beyond that and betrays their motives for taking action. This is an effort not to address those administrative duties but an ideological push in order to break the back of this movement.

This is the conceit of these authoritarians and our corrupted society. These are supposed to be elected administrators who are responsible for the humdrum job of lubricating society, nothing more. Instead of attempting to break the backs of movements in society, which is our right to do, they are supposed to provide sanitary facilities. It’s a disgrace that instead sanitary facilities were taken away. They are supposed to provide the public with a safer environment, that’s the reason we pay taxes to see this done. Yet we see crimes being committed in the most heavily policed places in these cities. Think about that for just a second, police are there in saturated numbers and they are completely unable or perhaps unwilling to stop crimes from happening.

Not a word is mentioned that crimes happened under the very noses of police while they look on, in many cases it was up to the citizenry there to address the problems themselves, which is ok but if that’s the case what then are the stewards for? What is their excuse for not executing the mandate for their very existence, to provide a safe environment in which these citizens can safely carry out their constitutionally protected right to action, what are the police and administrators good for? Instead of doing their jobs it seems they have facilitated crime instead, they have acted against the citizenry. Steering troubled individuals to these areas. With these actions all they do is bring into question their own legitimacy. The conceit that it is the police and city administrators job to crush dissent, rather than facilitating in a secular and objective manner the citizenry’s rising consciousness. That’s it’s the governments job to do this is published daily in mainstream media without question, so we know where their loyalties lay. People have forgotten that these are mere stewards. Over time the job of stewards has become that of an overseer class. Much to the benefit of the stewards, a definite promotion.

This shows beyond a shadow of any doubt just who the city administrators and police really work for and it is not for you and I who pay the taxes to support this system. It appears that all our government has become, both national and local, is a way to outsource to us our own oppression.

And yes it is a conspiracy. I’m not talking some star chamber cabal, though in this particular case that appears to be closer to truth than fiction. What is a conspiracy?

Conspiracy, Conspire: Make secret plans jointly to commit a harmful act; working together to bring about a particular result, typically to someones detriment. ORIGIN late middle English: from old French conspirer, from Latin conspirare- to agree, plot. From con- together, with spirare- breathe.

It’s up to you to decide whether police and city administrators are simply some bureaucratic automatons carrying out their mandate to keep the cities running with a semblance of tranquility. Or are they acting ideologically in concert against this rising public consciousness as embodied in this movement. Are they simply passive agents or are they working together to bring about a particular result, to the detriment of the changing awareness arising from OWS?

If you think they are working against this rising public awareness as embodied in OWS, this raising of consciousness. Then on who’s behalf are they working? It’s clearly not ours. Lets ask another conspiracy theory nutter like myself.

“Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people. To destroy this invisible government, to befoul this unholy alliance between corrupt business and corrupt politics is the first task of statesmanship.” -President Theodore Roosevelt

There is an entrenched system where people may seek power and privilege over society. Though it actually consists of a changing demographic, the names might change over time but the ideology does not. So it is more of a conspiracy to keep this system in place by a changing demographic of people who strive to stay at the top of what is simply a society wide game of king of the hill, it has always been such in every society in almost every culture.

Jiddu Krishnamurti says;
“We were saying how very important it is to bring about in the human mind the radical revolution, The crisis is a crisis in consciousness. A crisis that cannot anymore accept the old norms. The old patterns, the ancient traditions. And considering what the world is now, with all the misery, conflict, destructive brutality, aggression and so on. Man is still as he was, is still brutal, violent, aggressive, acquisitive, competitive and he has built a society along these lines.”

There have also always been some who speak out against this type of society.
I think I see that there is a rising consciousness about these circumstances in our society in OWS. That movement seeks to bring to light the conditions of the destructive, brutal and acquisitive nature of the power structure which seeks to entrench and enslave minds with the illusory promise of reward, that in the name of equality, surely a value to be admired, you too have a chance of being an oppressor. The movement is not even to the point of calling for any change in this system as of yet I don’t believe, much to the chagrin of entrenched power players who hungrily seek to blitzkreig this dawning awareness, because in some way they may find that doing so improves their ranking in the power structure or at the least maintains the game to which they have so much invested. The OWS movement is still at the level of simply acknowledging there are problems with this type of society and making others aware of that fact.

Clearly the levers of control in government do exist and are geared to oppressing this rising consciousness. Then who are at the levers of control, who uses these levers, who has means to even have access to them, who gains by it to even have levers of control, who’s has the motive to maintain the status quo? Yes, I call it conspiracy. But don’t think of some dimly lit chamber with insidious individuals sitting about, faces in shadow, planning. This is not necessary, nobody has to be told what to do, nobody has to be brought into the fold, it’s the voracious and brutal beast of entrenched ideology about which type of society is built. It’s a conspiracy by people in many levels of society who “believe” in this entrenched system of control that conspire to suppress any ideas of reorganizing society. This is where the rising consciousness of OWS is finding it’s opposition, conspirators who would kill it by a thousand cuts. These establishment shock troops who themselves only tenuously stand among a chaotic heap of writhing humans who have been forever struggling in a sociopathic Randian orgy of self interest, in their mind fighting for their very survival but unbeknownst to them they only ensure the continuation of the old patterns, the ancient traditions which have always sought to squelch out the sound of this rising consciousness, an intuitive call to build society on better grounds than the enrichment of a very few who feel it is their sovereign right to rule and do so through brutal, violent, aggressive and acquisitive means, and have throughout history used their influence to keep it so.

Simiantongue

“Does this qualify as a conspiracy?”

Absolutely. It’s one thing, city planners concern in dealing with the administrative difficulties of protests. Traffic, the use of more money for police and it’s effect on city budgets, maintaining public health etc. They claim with plausible deniability that these are the reasons for their actions.

A concerted effort such as coordinated effort to “crack down” on occupy movements goes far beyond that and betrays their motives for taking action. This is an effort not to address those administrative duties but an ideological push in order to break the back of this movement.

This is the conceit of these authoritarians and our corrupted society. These are supposed to be elected administrators who are responsible for the humdrum job of lubricating society, nothing more. Instead of attempting to break the backs of movements in society, which is our right to do, they are supposed to provide sanitary facilities. It’s a disgrace that instead sanitary facilities were taken away. They are supposed to provide the public with a safer environment, that’s the reason we pay taxes to see this done. Yet we see crimes being committed in the most heavily policed places in these cities. Think about that for just a second, police are there in saturated numbers and they are completely unable or perhaps unwilling to stop crimes from happening.

Not a word is mentioned that crimes happened under the very noses of police while they look on, in many cases it was up to the citizenry there to address the problems themselves, which is ok but if that’s the case what then are the stewards for? What is their excuse for not executing the mandate for their very existence, to provide a safe environment in which these citizens can safely carry out their constitutionally protected right to action, what are the police and administrators good for? Instead of doing their jobs it seems they have facilitated crime instead, they have acted against the citizenry. Steering troubled individuals to these areas. With these actions all they do is bring into question their own legitimacy. The conceit that it is the police and city administrators job to crush dissent, rather than facilitating in a secular and objective manner the citizenry’s rising consciousness. That’s it’s the governments job to do this is published daily in mainstream media without question, so we know where their loyalties lay. People have forgotten that these are mere stewards. Over time the job of stewards has become that of an overseer class. Much to the benefit of the stewards, a definite promotion.

This shows beyond a shadow of any doubt just who the city administrators and police really work for and it is not for you and I who pay the taxes to support this system. It appears that all our government has become, both national and local, is a way to outsource to us our own oppression.

And yes it is a conspiracy. I’m not talking some star chamber cabal, though in this particular case that appears to be closer to truth than fiction. What is a conspiracy?

Conspiracy, Conspire: Make secret plans jointly to commit a harmful act; working together to bring about a particular result, typically to someones detriment. ORIGIN late middle English: from old French conspirer, from Latin conspirare- to agree, plot. From con- together, with spirare- breathe.

It’s up to you to decide whether police and city administrators are simply some bureaucratic automatons carrying out their mandate to keep the cities running with a semblance of tranquility. Or are they acting ideologically in concert against this rising public consciousness as embodied in this movement. Are they simply passive agents or are they working together to bring about a particular result, to the detriment of the changing awareness arising from OWS?

If you think they are working against this rising public awareness as embodied in OWS, this raising of consciousness. Then on who’s behalf are they working? It’s clearly not ours. Lets ask another conspiracy theory nutter like myself.

“Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people. To destroy this invisible government, to befoul this unholy alliance between corrupt business and corrupt politics is the first task of statesmanship.” -President Theodore Roosevelt

There is an entrenched system where people may seek power and privilege over society. Though it actually consists of a changing demographic, the names might change over time but the ideology does not. So it is more of a conspiracy to keep this system in place by a changing demographic of people who strive to stay at the top of what is simply a society wide game of king of the hill, it has always been such in every society in almost every culture.

Jiddu Krishnamurti says;
“We were saying how very important it is to bring about in the human mind the radical revolution, The crisis is a crisis in consciousness. A crisis that cannot anymore accept the old norms. The old patterns, the ancient traditions. And considering what the world is now, with all the misery, conflict, destructive brutality, aggression and so on. Man is still as he was, is still brutal, violent, aggressive, acquisitive, competitive and he has built a society along these lines.”

There have also always been some who speak out against this type of society.
I think I see that there is a rising consciousness about these circumstances in our society in OWS. That movement seeks to bring to light the conditions of the destructive, brutal and acquisitive nature of the power structure which seeks to entrench and enslave minds with the illusory promise of reward, that in the name of equality, surely a value to be admired, you too have a chance of being an oppressor. The movement is not even to the point of calling for any change in this system as of yet I don’t believe, much to the chagrin of entrenched power players who hungrily seek to blitzkreig this dawning awareness, because in some way they may find that doing so improves their ranking in the power structure or at the least maintains the game to which they have so much invested. The OWS movement is still at the level of simply acknowledging there are problems with this type of society and making others aware of that fact.

Clearly the levers of control in government do exist and are geared to oppressing this rising consciousness. Then who are at the levers of control, who uses these levers, who has means to even have access to them, who gains by it to even have levers of control, who’s has the motive to maintain the status quo? Yes, I call it conspiracy. But don’t think of some dimly lit chamber with insidious individuals sitting about, faces in shadow, planning. This is not necessary, nobody has to be told what to do, nobody has to be brought into the fold, it’s the voracious and brutal beast of entrenched ideology about which type of society is built. It’s a conspiracy by people in many levels of society who “believe” in this entrenched system of control that conspire to suppress any ideas of reorganizing society. This is where the rising consciousness of OWS is finding it’s opposition, conspirators who would kill it by a thousand cuts. These establishment shock troops who themselves only tenuously stand among a chaotic heap of writhing humans who have been forever struggling in a sociopathic Randian orgy of self interest, in their mind fighting for their very survival but unbeknownst to them they only ensure the continuation of the old patterns, the ancient traditions which have always sought to squelch out the sound of this rising consciousness, an intuitive call to build society on better grounds than the enrichment of a very few who feel it is their sovereign right to rule and do so through brutal, violent, aggressive and acquisitive means, and have throughout history used their influence to keep it so.

http://www.nickmeador.org/ ndmeador

As Robert Anton Wilson has said, a “conspiracy” is just an affinity group that we perceive to be acting in opposition to our own desires or needs. Eighteen U.S. mayors coordinating to break up the occupy movement was definitely an affinity group — which is to say, they all had an interest in clearing the protestors out of their cities so they wouldn’t have to “deal with them” any more. There’s not much attempt at secrecy though, so that makes the word “conspiracy” less applicable.

http://www.nickmeador.org/ ndmeador

As Robert Anton Wilson has said, a “conspiracy” is just an affinity group that we perceive to be acting in opposition to our own desires or needs. Eighteen U.S. mayors coordinating to break up the occupy movement was definitely an affinity group — which is to say, they all had an interest in clearing the protestors out of their cities so they wouldn’t have to “deal with them” any more. There’s not much attempt at secrecy though, so that makes the word “conspiracy” less applicable.

Anonymous

I agree with you though. I want to know what she calls herself now then. Did she give up? Is someone blackmailing her? Or was her “activism” just a shallow attempt at getting into some kind of power position all along?

Jin Onikoroshi

the only thing about that i’d take issue with is eating guinea pigs….although i’m sure they are nice tasting in their own way….

Anon

You are conveniently failing to mention the violent counterparts that existed in each of those examples you have listed, which is the only reason that Ghandi and MLK’s respective positions were granted any legitimacy.